Been in the Storm So Long

by Leon F. Litwack

  24. Colored American, Jan. 6, 1866. See also New York Tribune, Nov. 29, 1865 (Convention of Colored People, South Carolina); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 18.

  25. Convention of the Freedmen of North Carolina (Sept.-Oct. 1865), 13; Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 9.

  26. National Freedman, I (Dec. 15, 1865), 364 (Convention of Colored People, Alabama); New Orleans Tribune, Sept. 24, 1865 (Address of Freedmen of Robeson Co., N.C); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 19. More than a hundred years later, at the peak of the civil rights struggle in the South, Malcolm X would make a similar pronouncement on the limits of black forbearance: “It’s simply not possible to love a man whose chief purpose in life is to humiliate you, and still be what is considered a normal human being.”

  27. Colored Tennessean, March 31, 1866 (Kentucky Colored People’s Convention); New York Tribune, Nov. 29, 1865 (Convention of Colored People, South Carolina); Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 9, 21; Proceedings of the Convention of Colored Citizens of the State of Arkansas Held in Little Rock … Nov. 30, Dec. 1 and 2 (Helena, 1866), 3–4.

  28. Convention of the Freedmen of North Carolina (Sept.-Oct. 1865), 13; Colored Tennessean, March 31, 1866 (Kentucky Colored People’s Convention); Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 9, 10, 12.

  29. Montgomery, “Alabama Freedmen: Some Reconstruction Documents,” 248; New York Times, Nov. 12, 1865 (Selma, Ala.).

  30. New York Times, June 20, 1866; American Freedman, I (Sept. 1866), 87 (Georgia Equal Rights Assn. meeting); Proceedings of the Convention of the Equal Rights and Educational Association of Georgia, Assembled at Macon, October 29th, 1866 (Augusta, 1866), 17; S. W. Laidler to Thaddeus Stevens, May 7, 1866, Stevens Papers, Library of Congress (New Bern freedmen’s meeting). Praise for the work of the Freedmen’s Bureau was voiced by conventions in Alabama (1865), Georgia (1866), Kentucky (1867), North Carolina (1865), South Carolina (1865), Tennessee (1865), and Virginia (1865).

  31. [State Exec. Comm. for Equal Political Rights in Missouri], An Address by the Colored People of Missouri to the Friends of Equal Rights (St. Louis, 1865), 3; South Carolina Leader, Nov. 25, 1865 (Convention of Colored People); “Our Wrongs and Rights,” Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 12–13.

  32. American Freedman, I (Sept. 1866), 87–88 (Georgia Equal Rights Assn. meeting); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 16–17; Proceedings of the State Convention of Colored Men, Held at Lexington, Kentucky, in the A.M.E. Church, November 26th, 27th, and 28th, 1867 (Frankfort, 1867), 5–6; Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 12.

  33. Colored Tennessean, Aug. 12, 1865 (Convention of the Colored People); New York Tribune, Nov. 29, 1865 (Convention of Colored People, South Carolina).

  34. Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 30. The address drawn up by the freedmen of North Carolina to the Constitutional Convention did complain of “unscrupulous and avaricious employers” who expelled blacks from the plantations and refused adequate compensation (Convention of the Freedmen of North Carolina, Sept.-Oct. 1865), and Tennessee and Georgia blacks demanded “just compensation” for labor performed (Colored Tennessean, Aug. 12, 1865; Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia, Jan. 1866, 29).

  35. National Freedman, I (Dec. 15, 1865), 364 (Convention of Colored People, Alabama); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 30; St. Landry Progress (Opelousas, La.), Sept. 7, 1867. For opposition to confiscation, see also New Orleans Tribune, June 12, 1867 (Radical Republican convention, Louisiana, June 1867), and New York Times, May 26, 1867 (James Harris of N.C.). The Alabama convention of 1867 called for the confiscation of property of employers who discharged blacks for exercising their civil rights (New Orleans Tribune, May 4, 1867), and Beverly Nash, a South Carolina black leader, thought the confiscation question should be settled by Congress and “we should make no expression of opinion about it” (New York Times, Aug. 9, 1867). For proconfiscation sentiment, see New Orleans Tribune, Sept. 10, 24, 1864, April 19, May 6, 1865, and New National Era, Jan. 26, 1871.

  36. See, e.g., Montgomery, “Alabama Freedmen: Some Reconstruction Documents,” 247, 249 (Colored People’s Convention, 1865); New York Tribune, Dec. 30, 1865 (Colored Convention of Maryland); Colored Tennessean, March 31, 1866 (Kentucky Colored People’s Convention); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 30.

  37. Christian Recorder Feb. 3, 1866. For similar sentiments, see, e.g., Christian Recorder, April 8 (“What Shall We Do to Be Respected?”), Aug. 26 (Charleston Corr.), Sept. 30 (H. H. Garnet), Dec. 9, 16, 23 (Advice to Freedmen), 1865; March 10 (“Trying Moment”), 17 (“The Jew and the Black Gentile”), 24 (Emigration), April 21 (S.C. Corr.), May 19 (“Get Land”), Aug. 18 (“Colored Conventions”), 25 (J. M. Langston), Sept. 22 (“Our Great Need”), 1866; Sept. 14 (J. M. Langston), Nov. 30 (“Self-Reliance the Key to Success”), 1867; Colored American, Jan. 6, 1866; Black Republican, April 15, 1865; Free Man’s Press, Aug. 1 (“Learn a Trade”), Sept. 5, 1868.

  38. Address by the Colored People of Missouri, 3; Colored Tennessean, March 31, 1866 (Kentucky Colored People’s Convention); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 29–30; Christian Recorder, Feb. 24, 1866 (H. M. Turner); Convention of Colored Men, Kentucky (Nov. 1867), 7. On equal access to public facilities, see, e.g., the Georgia (Jan. and Oct. 1866) and Kentucky (1867) conventions.

  39. Convention of Colored Men, Kentucky (Nov. 1867), 8–9; Convention of the Freedmen of North Carolina (Sept.-Oct. 1865), 5; Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 19–20, 29.

  40. Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 11; New Orleans Tribune, May 30, 1865 (Memorial of the Colored Men of Mississippi); Montgomery, “Alabama Freedmen: Some Reconstruction Documents,” 248, 249 (Colored People’s Convention, 1865).

  41. Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 29; New Orleans Tribune, May 30, 1865 (Memorial of the Colored Men of Mississippi); Colored Tennessean, Aug. 12, 1865 (Convention of the Colored People); Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 20; S. W. Laidler to Thaddeus Stevens, May 7, 1866, Stevens Papers, Library of Congress (New Bern freedmen’s meeting); Convention of Colored Men, Kentucky (Nov. 1867), 7; New York Tribune, Nov. 29, 1865 (Convention of Colored People, South Carolina).

  42. New Orleans Tribune, Aug. 9, 1864, April 6, 1865. See also the issues of Jan. 3, April 28, and July 23, 1865.

  43. Ibid., Jan. 14, 15, Feb. 5, 9, 14, 18, 19, 1865.

  44. Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 21; New Orleans Tribune, March 25, May 28, 1865.

  45. New Orleans Tribune, April 19, 1865. See also the issue of Nov. 25, 1866, which urged the election of “colored” judges and legislators. “But we want to fight that political contest squarely and fairly, under the banner of suffrage to all, and not by attempting the impracticable and impossible work of suppressing the minority.”

  46. Ibid, June 4, 1865.

  47. Black Republican, April 22, 1865; New Orleans Tribune, April 20, 1865; Proceedings of the Forty-eighth Annual Session of the Baltimore Conference of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, April 13th, 1865 (Baltimore, 1865), 8; Christian Recorder, April 22, 1865. See also Christian Recorder, June 3, 1865 (S.C. Conference), May 5, 1865 (J. C. Brock).

  48. Towne, Letters and Diary, 159–60, 162; Black Republican, April 22, 1865.

  49. New York Times, May 13, 1865; Pearson (ed.), Letters from Port Royal, 310–11; Botume, First Days Amongst the Contrabands, 173–75, 178; Harriet B. Greeley to Rev. George Whipple, April 29, 1865, American Missionary Assn. Archives; Black Republican, April 29, 1865.

  50. New Orleans Tribune, April 22, 28, 21, 1865; Proceedings of the Forty-eighth Session of the Baltimore Conf. of the AME Church, April 13, 1865, 9–10.

  51. Martin Abbott, “Freedom’s Cry: Negroes and Their Meetings in South Carolina, 1865–1869,” Phylon, XX (Fall 1959), 264 (Charleston Mutual Aid Society); New Orleans
Tribune, May 2, 6, April 22, July 27, 1865; Black Republican, April 22, 1865.

  52. Towne, Letters and Diary, 167.

  53. New Orleans Tribune, July 27, 30, Aug. 3, Sept. 9, Oct. 27, Dec. 9, 30, 1865. For a more hopeful view of Johnson, see South Carolina Leader, Oct. 21, Dec. 9, 1865.

  54. McPherson, The Political History of the United States of America During the Period of Reconstruction, 52–55; LaWanda and John H. Cox, Politics, Principle, & Prejudice, 1865–66 (Glencoe, Ill., 1963), 163. For black response to the interview, see New York Times, Feb. 9, 1866; Christian Recorder, Feb. 17, 1866.

  55. Christian Recorder, March 3, April 14, Sept. 8, 1866; Loyal Georgian, March 3, 1866. For black disillusionment with Johnson, see also New Orleans Tribune, Sept. 11, 15, 1866; Christian Recorder, Jan. 19, March 9, 1867; Loyal Georgian, March 17, Oct. 13, 1866.

  56. Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 21.

  57. Reid, After the War, 52. For the “taxation without representation is tyranny” argument, see Convention of Colored Citizens of Arkansas (1866), 6; Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 18; Convention of Colored Men, Kentucky (Nov. 1867), 7; Christian Recorder, Oct. 28, 1865 (Edgecombe, Co., N.C.); New York Times, Oct. 11, 1866 (Convention of Freedmen, North Carolina); New York Tribune, Nov. 29, 1865 (Convention of Colored People, South Carolina); Loyal Georgian, Oct. 13, 1866; New Orleans Tribune, Nov. 16, 1865; Black Republican, April 29, 1865.

  58. Address by the Colored People of Missouri (1865); New York Times, Sept. 17, 1865 (A. H. Galloway at the Convention of Freedmen, N.C); The Union (New Orleans), Dec. 1, 1863 (P. B. S. Pinchback); Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 29; Equal Suffrage. Address from the Colored Citizens of Norfolk, Virginia, to the People of the United States (New Bedford, Mass., 1865); Christian Recorder, Oct. 28, 1865 (Edgecombe Co., N.C), May 19, 1866.

  59. Christian Recorder, July 14, 1866; Colored American, Jan. 13, 1866.

  60. Herbert Aptheker, “South Carolina Negro Conventions, 1865,” Journal of Negro History, XXXI (1946), 94; Loyal Georgian, Feb. 17, 1866; Colored Tennessean, Oct. 7, 1865; New Orleans Tribune, Nov. 18, 1864, Dec. 15, 1866; Freedmen’s Convention of Georgia (Jan. 1866), 19; Proceedings of the Council of the Georgia Equal Rights Association, Assembled at Augusta, Ga., April 4th, 1866 (Augusta, 1866), 13; New York Times, Sept. 17, 1865 (A. H. Galloway at the Convention of Freedmen, N.C); Dennett, The South As It Is, 27.

  61. New Orleans Tribune, Nov. 18, 1864.

  62. Ibid., Aug. 1, 1865.

  63. Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 21–22; Reid, After the War, 144.

  64. Convention of the Colored People of Virginia (Aug. 1865), 22.

  65. New Orleans Tribune, Dec. 9, Nov. 18, 1864. See also the issue of May 4, 1865 (“Fallacy of ‘Preparation’ ”).

  66. National Freedman, I (Aug. 15, 1865), 220; New York Times, June 4, 1865; Equal Suffrage. Address from the Colored Citizens of Norfolk, Va. (1865), 9–15.

  67. On the “election” in Beaufort, see The Mission of the United States Republic: An Oration Delivered by Rev. James Lynch … July 4, 1865 (Augusta, 1865), 10; on a mayoralty election in Fernandina, see Reid, After the War, 160; on the registration and voting in New Orleans, see New Orleans Tribune, June 17, 23, 24, 30, July 12, 21, 28, Aug. 4, 18, 22, Sept. 2, 10, 17, 19, Nov. 7, 8, 10, 15, 1865.

  68. Blassingame, Black New Orleans, 1–22.

  69. New Orleans Tribune, Nov. 15, 16, 1864.

  70. Ibid, Sept. 2, 26, 1865.

  71. Christian Recorder, May 19, 1866.

  72. New Orleans Tribune, Nov. 11, Oct. 23, 1866.

  73. Colored Tennessean, Aug. 12, 1865 (Convention of the Colored People); New York Times, April 25, 1865 (Petition from “the colored men of East Tennessee”). See also New Orleans Tribune, April 4, July 25, 1865, Sept. 13, 1866.

  74. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, 3–4.

  75. Christian Recorder, Aug. 25, 1866. See also “The Negro an Inferior Race,” in ibid., Nov. 20, 1869 (D. A. Straker)

  76. Ibid., Oct. 4, 1877 (“Race Characteristics”).

  77. Ibid., Nov. 21, 1868 (“The American Negro”).

  78. Blassingame (ed.), Slave Testimony, 381; Colored Tennessean, Aug. 12, 1865 (Convention of the Colored People); Christian Recorder, Jan. 23, 1864 (H. M. Turner); Weekly Louisianian, Dec. 7, 1878 (“Spell It with a Capital”). On objections to “negro,” see also New Era, Aug. 18, 1870; nevertheless, the editor of Weekly Louisianian (Dec. 12, 1874) thought few if any “intelligent colored citizens” objected to the term, “though they very properly resent the contemptuous one when spelt with two gs.” On gradations of color, see New Orleans Tribune, May 23, 1865. For the debate over whether to strike “African” from the name of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, see Christian Recorder, Nov. 21, Dec. 19, 1863, April 9, 1864, March 25, April 1, 8, May 6, 1865; New Orleans Tribune, June 9, 1865.

  79. Loyal Georgian, April 10, 1867; New Era, Feb. 3, 1870.

  80. Christian Recorder, June 16, 1866; Semi-Weekly Louisianian, June 15, 1871.

  81. Semi-Weekly Louisianian, March 10, 1872 (H. H. Garnet); Christian Recorder, May 13, 1865.

  82. Christian Recorder, March 25 (J. Lynch), April 8 (G. Rue), 1865.

  83. New Orleans Tribune, Aug. 13, 1865, Feb. 18, 1869; Evans, Ballots and Fence Rails, 90; Christian Recorder, Nov. 27, 1869.

  84. Christian Recorder, June 30, 1866, Oct. 21, 1865.

  85. New Orleans Tribune, April 13, 1867 (Savannah meeting); Christian Recorder, Jan. 5, 1867; Josiah Gorgas, Ms. Journal, entry for July 9, 1867, Univ. of North Carolina.

  86. William S. Basinger to George W. J. DeRenne, Aug. 12, 1867, DeRenne Papers, Duke Univ.

  87. Loyal Georgian, July 6, 1867.

  88. B. F. Randolph to Bvt. Maj. Gen. R. K. Scott, Aug. 6, 1867, Records of the Assistant Commissioners, South Carolina (Letters Received), Freedmen’s Bureau (Randolph’s assassination was announced in Christian Recorder, Oct. 31, 1868); New Orleans Tribune, May 12, 1867. See also Loyal Georgian, July 6, 1867 (“A Word on Registration”).

  89. New Orleans Tribune, May 24, 1867. On the demands voiced by black political rallies, see, e.g., Christian Recorder, May 4, 1867 (Beaufort, S.C.); New Orleans Tribune, May 4 (Mobile), 10 (St. Louis), 1867; New York Times, Jan. 27 (Georgetown, D.C.), March 19 (Savannah), 27 (Charleston), April 2 (Savannah), 19 (Mobile), 24 (Petersburg, Va.), May 4 (Mobile), 8 (Talladega, Ala.), 9 (Jefferson Co, Fla.), 1867.

  90. New York Times, Oct. 28, Aug. 9, 31, 1867.

  91. Loyal Georgian, Aug. 10, 1867; New York Times, June 30, May 20, Sept. 25, 1867; Loyal Georgian, April 10, 1867. But Thomas W. Stringer, a black political leader in Mississippi, thought his people “more or less mistrustful” of all the candidates. “They know that there are but few southerners that will do altogether right by them in making the laws, and that northerners with a few exceptions, that are eligible, are no better.” Christian Recorder, May 11, 1867.

  92. Towne, Letters and Diary, 182–83; St. Landry Progress, Nov. 16, 1867.

  93. New York Times, May 28, 1867; Christian Recorder, Oct. 11, 1867 (M. R. Delany); Free Press (Charleston), April 5, 1868. On black political aspirations, see also Christian Recorder, Aug. 10 (“A Colored Man for Vice-President of the United States” and “Who Are Our Friends?”), Nov. 30 (J. C. Sampson), 1867; New York Times, Aug. 6, 9, Oct. 22, 1867.

  94. Christian Recorder, June 26, 1869 (M. R. Delany); New Orleans Tribune, June 12, 13, 14, 18, June 25, 29, July 11, 12, 31, 1867.

  95. New Orleans Tribune, May 17, June 12, May 19, Dec. 24, June 9, April 21, May 1, July 31, 1867.

  96. Macon Telegraph, reprinted in St. Landry Progress, Oct. 5, 1867.

  97. Edward Deane, Asst. Commissioner, Freedmen’s Bureau, Charleston, S.C., to Headquarters, Sub-Asst. Commissioner, Darlington, S.C., Aug. 24, 1867, with a newspaper clipping on the Rev. Nick Williams from Charleston Mercury, Aug. 24, 1867, instructions to investigate “the truth of the statements contained therein,” and an en
dorsement by the commanding officer in Darlington that he had already dispatched troops to arrest Williams. Records of the Assistant Commissioners, South Carolina (Letters Received), Freedmen’s Bureau. The arrest is also reported in New York Times, Sept. 9, 1867.

  98. F. W. Pickens to Adele Petigru Allston, Nov. 22, 1867, in Easterby (ed.), South Carolina Rice Plantation, 237; Josiah Gorgas, Ms. Journal, entries for March 9, July 14, Aug. 25, 1867, Univ. of North Carolina; Abner S. Williams, Mayor of Williamston, North Carolina, to Hon. Jonathan Worth, Sept. 8, 1866, Lt. C. W. Dodge to Lt. Col. Stephen Moore, Sept. 28, 1866, Records of the Assistant Commissioners, North Carolina (Letters Received), Freedmen’s Bureau. See H. S. Van Eaton to Bvt. Maj. Gen. A. Gillem, Nov. 24, 1867, Records of the Assistant Commissioners, Mississippi (Letters Received), Freedmen’s Bureau.

  99. Loyal Georgian, Aug. 10, 1867; John H. Bills, Ms. Diary, entries for July 16, 17, 29, 1867, Univ. of North Carolina; Edward Barnwell Heyward to “Tat” [Catherine Maria Clinch Heyward], May 5, 1867, Heyward Family Papers, Univ. of South Carolina.

  100. Lt. H. R. Williams to Lt. Merritt Barber, Feb. 10, 1868, Records of the Assistant Commissioners, Mississippi (Letters Received), Freedmen’s Bureau; New York Times, Jan. 30, 1868 (Bureau circular, Albany, Ga.). For reports that the impending elections had revived hopes among freedmen of land redistribution, see Fisk P. Brewer to Rev. George Whipple, May 27, 1867, American Missionary Assn. Archives; Sarah M. Payne to Mary Clendenin, Dec. 14, 1867, Historical Society of Pennsylvania; Robert Philip Howell, Ms. Memoirs, 24, Univ. of North Carolina; Mrs. Mary Jones to Mrs. Mary S. Mallard, May 15, 1867, in Myers (ed.), Children of Pride, 1382; New York Times, May 18, June 14, July 23, Aug. 13, Oct. 11, 1867, Feb. 28, 1868.

  101. Ravenel, Private Journal, 306; Theodore G. Barker to Benjamin Allston, Oct. 10, 1867, in Easterby (ed.), South Carolina Rice Plantation, 235; William Heyward to James Gregorie, June 4, 1868, Gregorie-Elliott Collection, Univ. of North Carolina. The same suggestion was made in a Macon newspaper, as quoted in New York Times, Aug. 13, 1867.